Today is Thanksgiving Day. Predictably, and like a billion other Americans, I joined my family for a huge traditional turkey dinner. Everything about the day was as it has always been – my mother cooking, me helping somewhat, the table setting, the thanks we gave before our meal. Yet, this Thanksgiving was markedly different from other years. This year we sat at the Thanksgiving table, for the first time in my 44 years of life, without my father.

Dad passed away from pancreatic cancer on August 30th of this year, at the age of 69. It was six weeks until his 70th birthday, twelve weeks until his 70th Thanksgiving. Losing my father seemed to come right on the heels of losing my brother, although my brother left us six years ago. Mike died from brain cancer on October 14th, 2006. Thanksgiving 2006 was another anomaly – the first without…